Did she even want to? Was the remote possibility of finding a way to his deeper emotions worth putting hers at risk?
She could walk away right now and it would hurt, but she would get over him.
Eventually.
The past year had at least shown her the former if not the latter.
But he wasn’t just asking her to take a chance on dating, on a relationship. He wasn’t asking anything.
He was blackmailing her and because Max saw the whole thing as some kind of business deal with fringe benefits, he didn’t even think there was anything wrong with that.
“The fringe benefits, as you call them, go both directions,” he said, a sardonic twist to his mouth.
“I said that out loud, didn’t I?” Darn it.
He smirked, his hand gliding along her thigh suggestively. “Yes.”
Romi did her best to ignore the sparks dancing along her nerve endings from his touch. “So, you’re not going to tell me about the loss that proved to you that love was weakness, are you?”
“You believe I’ve suffered some trauma that left me incapable of letting my emotions control me?” He left his hand resting on her thigh, but stilled its movement.
“Have you?”
“I learned early that romantic love didn’t count for much when other more important considerations were on the table, but it wasn’t anything my mother hadn’t been telling me since before I could walk.”
Romi couldn’t take her eyes off that large masculine hand covering her thigh. “Your mom doesn’t believe in love?”
“With good reason. No affection ever lasted beyond the point at which she became an inconvenience.”
“She doesn’t seem bitter.” While Romi had only met her a handful of times, she’d never gotten the impression that Natalya Black was one of those cynical women that made everyone bleed with their bitterness.
“She is not. She is a realist.”
Who had taught her son to see erotic love as a weakness. “And she wanted to protect you from heartache.”
“Yes.” He looked a little surprised by the idea and his own agreement to it.
“How old were you when you learned this lesson?” The idea of him in love hurt her in some indefinable way, especially if he’d been a vulnerable teen, risking his heart.
“Ten.”
“So not a personal loss?” Surprise, surprise.
“It was very personal.”
“But the romance was between your mother and her lover.” No way had Max been in love at such a young age.
“Batya made Mama glow for three years.”
“He was Russian?”
“No. He was American. Batya is a Russian nickname for father. It is what I called him.”
And Max hadn’t reverted to using the man’s given name later. That said something about how deeply the hurt went. How ingrained that role had been in Max’s heart.
“And you?”
“He lived with us, though I realized later it must only have seemed that way. Our home was not his, but he was there every evening, adding a sense of security to our small house. Batya took me to ball games, came to my school and culture center activities. He sat at the head of our table on holidays and took us out for our birthdays.”
In other words, he’d been Max’s dad. For a little while anyway. “But it didn’t last.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Does it matter?”
“Probably not.” The lesson here was that Max had clearly opened his heart to this man who had acted like a father, only to have it crushed when the man walked away.
“Have you ever been in love?”
“No chance.” The words were spoken with such quiet vehemence, she knew he had never been that vulnerable teenager she worried about.
Max truly had learned his lessons early and he’d taken them to heart until no one would accuse him of having one.
“Me, either.” And honestly?
She wasn’t keen to fall right now, but every minute spent in this man’s company was undermining Romi’s belief she had any say in the matter.
She wasn’t sure what it was about that sad little story that got to her so much, but no way could she ever see Max as a monster. No matter what pressures he brought to bear for his marriage plan.
“You really hedged your bets with this marriage thing, didn’t you?” she asked, needing to move away from the emotional morass their discussion had become for her.
“If by that you mean I considered every contingency, you would be right.”
“Maddie is out of town on her honeymoon. You know I don’t want to interrupt her with a call to ask about her contingency plan.”
“You do not trust me regarding the details?”